I think that the grandfather killed himself in the end because he felt that his life quest was over. He had achieved his dream of moving to Odessa to find a wife. He found the love of his life and stared a family that was successful and grew with time. He was also able to finish his mission of going back to his hometown and make peace with leaving. I think that he felt serious guilt for surviving the Nazi massacre and by seeing another survivor he was able to come to terms with making it out alive. I also think that he was able to come to peace with leaving his past identity, for example being Jewish. To me, the grandfather killed himself because both of his lives were over, his life with his wife and their family in Odessa but also his life in Trachtenberg.
This is very different from the reason the couple in Toga Party decided to kill themselves. This to me was more about having nothing to look forward to and decided to end life early as a way to escape the boring future ahead of them. They killed themselves because they did not want to suffer in old age and were content with their past. It was not about being finished with life but more about escaping it. They had already described how their children don’t visit often and they didn’t really even want to go to the toga party. This to me shows that they look back on their more exciting past as they best that is going to happen so they saw no point to just fade into the last years of their life. simply, they killed themselves because they wanted life to be over not because it was like with the grandfather.
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